


Stakeout

by lillianmmalter



Category: Agent Carter (TV)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-14
Updated: 2019-06-14
Packaged: 2020-04-07 23:26:15
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,275
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19095160
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lillianmmalter/pseuds/lillianmmalter
Summary: Stuck in a surveillance van on their anniversary, Daniel and Peggy talk.





	Stakeout

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Emily84](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Emily84/gifts).



> For Emily84. This is probably a bit angstier than you were hoping for, but that's where my mind is at these days. I hope you like it anyway!

Daniel stared dolefully at the thermos as the last, reluctant drop of coffee fell from its rim into the travel mug Jarvis had packed for them.

“This night just got unbearably long,” he said.

Peggy rolled her eyes. “Oh, don’t be such a baby. We’ve had longer nights than this before.”

“Yeah, but neither of us is as young as we used to be either.”

“Speak for yourself,” Peggy said, throwing a grin over her shoulder before going back to fiddling with the radio dials.

A tip about a minor suspect had come in just after Jack left to follow a major lead on a different case with most of the other agents in the office. Peggy, coat already on to leave for the night, had insisted on following up on it, and Daniel had insisted on tagging along in the dim hope he could still save their anniversary dinner.

That had been five hours ago.

“You know, he’s probably asleep. Like we should be.” 

The tiny screen of the black and white monitor in front of them showed the same fuzzy image of the warehouse frontage as it had when they first set up Howard’s tiny spy camera on the telephone pole across the street.

“Life of an agent, Darling.”

“You’re Deputy Director, Peg. This is the sort of grunt work you’re meant to delegate.”

He hadn’t meant the remark to cut, but Peggy reacted as though he’d hit her. Her expression grew pained, then that very Peggy mixture of vulnerable and brave. She chewed on her bottom lip for a moment.

“Are you angry with me?” she asked quietly. “For chasing this lead instead of going out as we’d planned?”

The silence in the van was suddenly weighted, the air holding an expectant quality that had Daniel’s stomach twisting in knots.

Now was as good a time to have this conversation as ever, he supposed. Ignoring it hadn’t done anything to fix it so far, so maybe confronting the problem would work out better. It nearly always seemed to work for Peggy, after all.

He swallowed, allowing himself the short delay before speaking. “I’m disappointed we missed our reservation earlier and that we’re wasting the opportunity of an empty house right now. I’m tired and still a little hungry after those sandwiches we ate earlier. But I’m mostly wondering if there’s a reason you don’t want to come home at night anymore. If the workload really has gotten that crazy with Phillips about to retire, or if you’re just using it as an excuse.”

“Daniel . . . .”

He looked back over at her. “Did you know tonight is the longest amount of time we’ve spent together since Bobby got his tonsils out?”

Peggy’s chin started to wobble. Fuck, he didn’t want to have this conversation.

“I’m not angry at you, Peggy,” he said, looking away again. “I guess I just want to know where we stand. It was one thing to spend our date nights like this before the kids arrived, when we were building SHIELD up from scratch, but it’s different now. At least I thought it was supposed to be.”

“I thought this might remind you of those early days in a good way. Back when everything was new.”

Daniel held back a sigh. “Why would I need a reminder? I’m not so old yet that I don’t remember our life together anymore. Neither are you.” 

“I worry you’ll stop loving me,” Peggy said softly, barely more than a murmur, as though she was afraid to say it at all.

Daniel’s head snapped around to goggle at her. “What?”

“I can’t help it. I see you sometimes at the kids’ events, the way you look at the other mums. They’re always there for their families, always, and half the time I’m out of town or out of the country, and I know that makes me a bad mother.”

“What the hell are you talking about?” Daniel asked, completely baffled.

“I missed Bobby’s science fair last month. He was so proud of his project, and–”

“Honey, he understood. Being at the White House to advise Kennedy against starting a nuclear war with Russia kinda takes precedence over his fruit fly experiment.”

“Cindy had to go to the Jarvises for help with her bake sale.”

“Because we both would have burned whatever we tried to help her make,” Daniel said. None of this was making any sense. He didn’t understand what Peggy’s mothering skills had to do with her working so much, with her practically avoiding him outside their few interactions at the office. 

Then he remembered the way Peggy reacted to her mother’s death the year before, and suddenly everything made sense. 

“Peggy, are you trying to tell me you’ve been working so much lately because you’re trying to run away from some misplaced guilt over not being the perfect wife and mother?”

“I’m not running away from anything. The only things you should run away from are explosions and door to door salesmen.”

Daniel laughed, probably a little harder than the quip deserved. Relief rushed over him in a wave. They could fix this distance between them. If this was all it was about, they could fix it.

“Honey, I love you, but your stiff upper lip has you running from your emotions way more often than you run from explosions or door to door salesmen.”

Peggy’s eyes flashed, indignant. “I do not!”

He shrugged, grinning. “I guess you are the cause of a lot of explosions you then have to run away from. And if my memory’s correct, one of them even involved a salesman.”

She thwapped him on the shoulder with her notepad, her lips twitching up at the corners. 

“You’re ridiculous.”

“And you love me anyway.”

A smile bloomed on her face, making his heart swell with joy for causing it.

“I do,” she said.

He leaned over to steal a kiss, which she immediately deepened. Daniel’s yearning for their empty house rose up in him again. It wouldn’t be appropriate for SHIELD’s Deputy Director to sleep with her husband in one of the agency’s surveillance vans, it would be setting a bad precedent. Still, the thought did cross his mind. It had been weeks, and this was still the night of their anniversary. Sort of.

The radio crackled with an odd screeching sound. They pulled apart with a wet smack, only to find no trace of movement on the monitor.

“Do you think that was–”

The warehouse door rolled up, and a delivery truck rolled out, its engine off and headlights dark.

“Well, that’s not suspicious at all,” Daniel said, reaching up to the knobs to try getting a clearer picture.

Peggy peered at the screen closely, then sat back with large eyes. Her right hand reached for the radio dispatch.

“I’m calling Jack back in,” she said, just as a familiar figure walked out from behind the truck.

“Son of a bitch,” Daniel breathed. The lead witness in Jack’s case was walking casually beside the suspect in theirs. The two cases were now inextricably linked, and a lot more complicated than any of them had bargained for.

“Sorry, Darling. It seems any anniversary plans are now well and truly dead.”

“As long as we can crash into the same bed at some point in the next 48 hours, and not leave it for at least ten, I don’t even care anymore.”

“That sounds heavenly. Let’s put these bastards behind bars first though.”

“Yes, Ma’am.”

Daniel took a sip of his now cold coffee, grimaced, and got to work, Peggy’s confident voice ringing out across the airwaves beside him.


End file.
